The Death of the Virgin

In 1656 Pope Alexander VII had Pietro da Cortona give the small church of Santa Maria della Pace, near Piazza Navona, a new curved front and a little square to set it off. Around 1657, pressed by a Roman nobleman, Duke Salviati,, the pope also gave Giovanni Maria Morandi a large Death of the Virgin to hang high in the church's octagonal crossing. This canvas is the trial version, painted to settle the design. Mary lies back on a pillow, hands joined, eyes lifted to the angels breaking through the dark above, while the apostles crowd around the bed. The sketch stayed with the Salviati family and reached the Borghese by inheritance. In 1833 it was listed as the work of Carlo Maratti, the Roman painter whose manner Morandi followed closely, and Morandi's name returned to it only in 1893.